BP 4 Podcasting by Apple Education

Screenshot from GarageBand '11

I’ve been using podcasts in my classroom for about four years now. I share these podcasts with students. They usually feature my voice, or that of a colleague, demonstrating a basic skill that students must master, like how to use a microscope, or an overview of some procedure that students must repeat, like setting up their lab books. I post these podcasts to my web site so that students can access them at home or on campus. All of my podcasts thus far have been “enhanced,” meaning that they include images along with the narration.

The Apple Education web site is a valuable one that I know exists but seldom take the time to visit. (Yes, one of many such sites!) So, when I saw the link to Apple Education Podcasts in the Online Degree’s list of “100 Essential Web 2.0 Tools for Teachers,” I decided to take a new look. I’m glad I did!

The Apple Education webpage on podcasting focuses mostly on audio podcasts that a user can create using GarageBand ’11 (also known as GarageBand 6). In the past, I have had my students working in GarageBand 5, which, functionally, is very similar in terms of its podcasting capabilities. I have my students work in groups when they create podcasts and pose some sort of question, which they must debate in their podcast. For example, my teaching partner and I ask our freshman Biology students to take controversial issues in biotechnology—human cloning, for example—and hold a debate in about three to five minutes. One student always assumes the “pro” position, another the “con,” and the third student is the moderator. Students have created some amazing projects in the past, and it’s a much more interesting product to review than a paper analyzing both sides of the argument. To me, the assignment is a great example of using technology to complement and enrich a curriculum.

The reason, though, that I’m excited by Apple’s page on podcasting, is that it summarizes some new features that I think will allow me to make podcasting a more frequent component of my communication with students and their parents. Reading this site, I learned that Podcast Producer 2, built into OS X Lion, will make publishing my own podcasts, and those of my students, much easier. The new version (an improvement on Podcast Capture, which is included in OS X Snow Leopard) will enable institutions to produce and publish podcasts en masse—a feature that I’m hopeful my school will take advantage of, as we work to update our web site.

Currently, when I have my students create their own podcasts, it’s a very time-consuming process to download their projects and then post them to my web site. With the new features in Podcast Producer 2 (to which my school will upgrade in the 2012 school year), I will be able to streamline the process.